The integration of electronic management systems into vehicles has been increasing progressively with a corresponding reduction in the cost of components required to assemble such management systems. These management systems generally provide a host of functions including such things as monitoring of distance travelled and state of various fluids in the vehicle in order to determine when a service of the vehicle is due, manage ignition timings and other vehicle monitoring activities.
At present, as far as the applicant is aware, an output from a system of this nature is displayed as a readout on a dashboard of the vehicle. A user of the vehicle must interpret the readout in order to take appropriate action where necessary. For instance, if oil level in the vehicle is low a light may be illuminated on the dashboard indicating to a user that replenishment of the vehicle's oil supply is necessary. It may sometimes occur that the readout is transient in nature and does not re-occur, which can cause frustration at the time of servicing of the vehicle. Thus, it would be useful to have a means of recording information relating to the readout when such an event occurs for later analysis and, if necessary, remedial action to be taken.